I was bullied and victimised: discrimination watchdog tables her distress

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The high profile barrister and author, Jocelynne Scutt, has
ended a troubled term as Tasmania's first anti-discrimination
commissioner with a sweeping attack on the state's legal
institutions.

The state's Supreme Court was also a target of the broadside
that extended to lawyers, the Director of Public Prosecutions,
Ombudsman and Department of Justice.

Dr Scutt said attempts were made to destabilise her office and
she was bullied and coerced. Support in the job was denied her, as
was natural justice and a duty of care.

"The attacks pained me deeply, causing me huge grieving and
distress," she said in her last annual report, tabled in the
Tasmanian Parliament yesterday.

A widely known feminist and lawyer, Dr Scutt came to Tasmania in
1999, early in the premiership of the late Jim Bacon.

Rocky relationships developed with many in the legal system,
which Dr Scutt put down to resistance to her attempts to administer
the Anti-Discrimination Act. "Bullying, pressure and other means
have been employed to curtail the independence of the office and to
curb the integrity of decision-making," she wrote.

Dr Scutt said she considered suing for defamation, false
imprisonment, abuse of process, contempt of court and
victimisation. But such a step would require confidence in
Tasmania's justice system.

She recounted one case in which the Supreme Court denied her
procedural fairness, adding: "In my extensive experience as a
member of counsel, admitted to practice in every Australian
jurisdiction and practising in most of them, I have never
encountered such an approach outside this state."

Unique in Australia, she said, Tasmania's DPP could act as a
solicitor in civil matters, meaning they could appear in an
anti-discrimination case.

Dr Scutt said a small number of Tasmanian lawyers habitually
used abusive and unprofessional language, and she once received a
pornographic image and a brutal statement that appeared to have
come from someone in the legal profession. She also had to ask for
police protection.

She said the commission received little thanks for its work or
assistance against attempts to destabilise it.

Dr Scutt did not reapply for the position at the end of her
five-year term and indicated yesterday she was putting the
experience behind her. She had restored her name to the Melbourne
bar's practice list, she said.

The state's Attorney-General, Judy Jackson, declined to comment,
but the shadow attorney-general, Michael Hodgman, said the
government owed Dr Scutt an apology.